With the rapid development of an OTT (Over The Top) service, a mobile operator faces a dilemma in which a volume increases but a revenue does not increase, and needs to seek a new revenue source to maintain a stable growth of the revenue. Network capability opening is an attempt made by the operator to increase the revenue. Network capability is hoped to open to a third-party application, so as to enhance service experience of the third-party application and implement a new business model. The network capability opening is classified into a query type and a control type. An example of capabilities of the query type is to acquire a location of a user, a state of a cell, or an online state of a user; and an example of capabilities of the control type is to set required quality of service (Quality of Service, QoS) for a service.
An existing network capability opening architecture mainly consists of an application server, a capability opening gateway, a wireless core network, and a radio access network. An application programming interface (Application Programming Interface, API) can be provided for the application server through the capability opening gateway, so that the application server acquires capability information of a wireless network or controls the wireless network.
In the network capability opening architecture, specific functions of the components are as follows:
Capability opening gateway: Completes third-party authentication, acquires capability information of the wireless network, performs aggregation and arrangement provides a northbound capability opening API for a third party to invoke, and completes conversion between a southbound interface and a northbound interface.
Policy server: Performs policy control and policy authorization; refers to a policy and charging rules function (Policy and Charging Rule Function, PCRF) on a 3rd generation partnership project (3rd Generation Partnership Project, 3GPP) network; and, in the capability opening architecture, connects to the capability opening gateway through a standard Diameter Rx interface to implement QoS capability opening.
Wireless core network: Specifically refers to a mobility management entity (Mobility Management Entity, MME), a serving gateway (Serving Gateway, S-GW), and a packet data network gateway (Packet data network GateWay, P-GW) on a long term evolution (Long Term Evolution, LTE) network; refers to a serving GPRS support node (Support GPRS Serving Node, SGSN), and a gateway GPRS support node (Gateway GPRS Support Node, GGSN) on a universal mobile telecommunications system (Universal Mobile Telecommunication System, UMTS) network; and, in the capability opening architecture, enhances the GGSN/P-GW, and reports a cell location and a cell state of a user equipment (User Equipment, UE) to the capability opening gateway.
Radio access network: Refers to an evolved NodeB (evolved Node B, eNodeB) on an LTE network; refers to a radio network controller (Radio Network Controller, RNC) and a NodeB on a UMTS network; and, in the capability opening architecture, enhances the eNodeB or the RNC, and reports a cell location and a cell state of a UE to the wireless core network through a user plane.
However, in the existing capability opening architecture, a capability opening gateway does not have information of a radio environment in which a UE resides, such as current signal quality and a current wireless access technology of the UE. When the capability opening gateway requires the radio environment information of the UE, firstly the radio environment information is acquired through a radio access network, then the radio environment information is transmitted to a wireless core network, and finally the wireless core network transmits the radio environment information to the capability opening gateway. This requires that the radio access network and the wireless core network be upgraded or reconstructed, and interconnection and interworking between different device vendors may also be involved, making deployment quite difficult.